Access to Gmail restored in Iran

Iranian authorities have restored access to Gmail, one week after they blocked it from users in Iran.

The Google search engine is still blocked and no announcements have been made about it.

The Mehr News Agency reported that the internet censorship committee claimed “technical difficulties” had caused the week-long access problem. “Gmail’s blocking was not intentional, and we never wanted to or plan to block Gmail and other Google services,” an Iranian official said.

Iran’s Minister of Communications and Information Technology had said earlier that Gmail had become inaccessible due to “violation of the country’s laws by the order of the judiciary.”

Abdolsammad Khorramabadi, head of the group dealing with “criminal content” on the internet announced to ISNA that the attempt to block YouTube had led to blocking of Google and Gmail.

The recent video on YouTube that mocks the Prophet Mohammad has led to protests in many Muslim countries. Iran has condemned the U.S. for failing to deal with the American producers of the video. Meanwhile, Google has refused to remove the video from YouTube, saying it does not violate any of its regulations.